Archive for spirituality

I do this writer’s group thing with a couple friends I met through my creative writing class last semester. We meet up every other Wednesday at the coffee place on campus, exchange the stuff we’ve been working on and sip our drinks. Afterwards, we get to talking about anything. Here’s what I figured out today:

If it weren’t for my religion, I would be so fucking messed up.

Don’t worry, this is not going to be a “FIND GOD AND HE’LL FORGIVE YOU!” schpeel at all. Not even close. Firstly, I’m not a Christian so the whole salvation from sin thing isn’t the core of my beliefs. I’m a Baha’i. (bahai.org) We want world peace. We think all religions are true but different based on the time period of which they appeared. We like men and women to be equal and for there to be no prejudice or racism.

Anyway, I get emotionally involved in everything I do, hear, say, read. Everything. I walk into my Principles of Lit class and ask the people around me if they cried over the last section we had to read. They stare at me like I have three heads and stretch out a long, “No.” I fully admit that I’m probably a little crazy. But when I hear a song I like, I read about it and study the lyrics and memorize it and learn the whole history behind it. I don’t watch good movies once; I buy them and see them dozens of times. I look for new underlying messages and symbols. I study the actors and the writing of the film. Everything I see or read, I connect to a part of me, and that’s what makes me so empathetic. I get empathetic and worked up a lot, because this world is full of so much shit and awful things.

My religion promises world peace through the implementation of its core priniciples. If I didn’t have this faith, this idea of a better day and the tools for it, I swear I would probably be a major drug addict or I would have killed myself by now. Maybe it means that deep down, I’m a weak human being. But everyone’s got one thing that keeps their head above the water and this is mine. I’d be nothing if I weren’t a Baha’i.

“O Son of Spirit!

My first Counsel is this: Possess a pure, kindly and radiant heart, that thine may be a sovereignty ancient, imperishable and everlasting.”